71 Replies

i don't consider myself to be very Anal retentive, but i have been told other wise. with that said, I like my SW to be as neat and complete as possible, even the Wyse terminals that i can't scan i have gone in and manually updated all the information including serial number. this of course has required me to walk around all three of our buildings and document the devices, i am half done. i also take the time to fully document issues, and if that issue is related to multiple machines, i connect all of those machines with in the ticket system. My goal is my mine and anyone who might have to pick up the pieces suddenly jobs easier. I don;t intend to leave, but who knows what will happen. I have been the guy picking up the pieces before and it is no fun to be lost.

I occasionally go through the Spiceworks inventory and verify all information. I then make any changes. I do this a few times a year, however it is as time allows. I don't see the point of having a database without it being clean.

I help look after several sites, so I try to keep our inventory up-to-date due to people leaving, starting or changing roles and also due to device failures; if I didn't it wouldn't be long before I wouldn't know who had been issued what and where it now is; so yes, I suppose I am 'anal' too, if it means keeping on top of all of our equipment and software.

When managing the network with SW, I try to ensure all computer names are correct, IP's are checked, all fields also entered correctly almost to the extent of OCD

Do you guys do the same, or do you just bung in a few bits of information and let it be?

Have you seen me post on RAID 5? I'm rather anal.

True that. However, I agree with you completely about RAID 5. So, maybe I'm anal, too.

As far as Spiceworks goes, time is a huge factor for me. I'm a single person shop with 140 users and growing. Would I like to have a more accurate database? Of course. Do I have time to go through it often? Nope.

Depends on the need, do you lease or buy your machines? Why do you need to know the name/model and specs of the machine your replacing?

If there is no need, then there is no inventory to take of whatever your sending down to your recycling company.

But, in a bigger place, where i used to work, they wanted to keep track of all machine that was thrashed to remove them from the books, never understood what it meant actually and why they bothered but some places do.

A good up-to-date DB of what is actually running is the only thing you need, keeping your machine in an OU when they do not physically exist anymore is rather pointless to me unless running multiple sites that dont ship back their machines when you replace them.

As for having an extensive detailed DB and or up to date AD is priceless so I'm as ANAL as anyone, the bigger it gets the more anal you should be because an out of control inventory sucks when you are asked for reports on things running at your company.

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Is it anal - retentive or anal-retentive, or is there even a hyphen in there at all?

Having said that, I agree that while some data is better than no data, it's useless unless it's accurate. I have been working on inventory myself, and one of my "sh!#pile" projects is to update everything in Spiceworks so that when I get an email telling me such and such printer is getting low on toner, I can just have a box delivered to that printer and be done with it.